Wednesday, February 01, 2017

Focus Features has provided a formal press release today with some new details about the untitled (yes, it is careful to note, untitled) new Paul Thomas Anderson project, including cast and crew members as well as some new details about the story.

LOS ANGELES, February 1st, 2017 – Production has begun in the U.K. on writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson’s untitled new film. Three-time Oscar winner Daniel Day-Lewis is joined in the cast by Lesley Manville, who was a BAFTA Award nominee for Best Actress for Another Year, and Vicky Krieps, whose films include A Most Wanted Man and Focus Features’ Hanna.

Focus holds worldwide rights to the film, and will distribute the film in the U.S. later this year with Universal Pictures handling international distribution.

The film’s producers are JoAnne Sellar, Megan Ellison, through her Annapurna Pictures, and Paul Thomas Anderson. The executive producers are Peter Heslop, Adam Somner, and Daniel Lupi. Chelsea Barnard and Jillian Longnecker are overseeing production for Annapurna.

Continuing their creative collaboration following 2007’s There Will Be Blood, which earned Mr. Day-Lewis the Best Actor Academy Award, Mr. Anderson will once again explore a distinctive milieu of the 20th century. The new movie is a drama set in the couture world of 1950s London. The story illuminates the life behind the curtain of an uncompromising dressmaker commissioned by royalty and high society.

Perhaps least surprising of all this is the fact that Jonny Greenwood and Mark Bridges have signed on for the film, while it's a pleasant surprise to see Dylan Tichenor back in the mix, having not edited for Paul in almost exactly a decade.

The release goes so far as to identify Veronique Melery and Michael Bauman as the film's set decorator and lighting camerman, respectively, but curiously omits who will be serving as cinematographer. We have certain theories about why that might be but we'll hold off on reporting that for now...